by Mary Shelley
When alone in an evening, I often walk towards Menaggio. I have selected a haunt among rocks close to the water’s edge, shaded by an olive-wood.
I always feel renewed and extreme delight as I watch the shadows of evening climb the huge mountains, till the granite peaks alone shine forth glad and bright, and a holy stillness gathers over the landscape. With what serious yet quick joy do such sights fill me; and dearer still is the aspiring thought that seeks the Creator in his works, as the soul yearns to throw off the chains of flesh that hold it in, and to dissolve and become a part of that which surrounds it.
This evening my friends are gone to Como, and I sat long on my favourite seat, listening to the ripplet of the calm lake splashing at my feet; to the murmur of running streams, and to the hollow roar of the mysterious torrent — the Fiume Latte — which is borne, softened by distance, from the opposite shore; viewing the magnificent mountain scene, varied by the lights and shadows caused by the setting sun. My heart was elevated, purified, subdued. I prayed for peace to all; and still the supreme Beauty brooded over me, and promised peace; at least there where change is not, and love and enjoyment unite and are one. From such rapt moods the soul returns to earth, bearing with it the calm of Paradise:
Quaie è colni, che sognando vede,
E dopo ‘l sogno la passione impressa
Rimane, e l’altro alla mente non riede;
Cotal son io, che quasi tutta cessa
Mia visione, ed ancor mi distilla
Nel cor il dolce, che nacque da casa.
Cori la neve al sol si dissigilla;
Cosi al vento nelle foglie lievi
Si perdea la sentenzia di Sibilla.
It has seemed to me — and on such an evening, I have felt it, — that this world, endowed as it is outwardly with endless shapes and influences of beauty and enjoyment, is peopled also in its spiritual life by myriads of loving spirits; from whom, unawares, we catch impressions, which mould our thoughts to good, and thus they guide beneficially the course of events, and minister to the destiny of man. Whether the beloved dead make a portion of this holy company, I dare not guess; but that such exists, I feel. They keep far off while we are worldly, evil, selfish; but draw near, imparting the reward of heaven-born joy, when we are animated by noble thoughts, and capable of disinterested actions. Surely such gather round me this night, and make a part of that atmosphere of peace and love which it is paradise to breathe.
I had thought such ecstacy as that in which I now was lapped dead to me for ever; but the sun of Italy has thawed the frozen stream — the cup of life again sparkles to the brim. Will it be removed as I turn northward? I fear it will. I grieve to think that we shall very soon leave Cadenabbia — the first sad step towards quitting Italy.
LETTER IX.
Italian Poetry. — Italian Master. — The Country People. — The Fulcino. — Grand Festa. — Adieu to Cadenabbia.
CADENABBIA, 7TH SEPT.
WE leave Cadenabbia in a day or two. I go unwillingly; the calm weather invites my stay, by dispelling my fears. (P.’s boat has left us. I bade it a grateful adieu, glad that it went leaving me scatheless; sorry to see it go, as a token of our too speedy departure.) The heat is great in the middle of the day, and I read a great deal to beguile the time, chiefly in Italian; for it is pleasant to imbue one’s mind with the language and literature of the country in which one is living: and poetry — Italian poetry — is in harmony with these scenes. The elements of its inspiration are around me. I breathe the air; I am sheltered by the hills and woods which give its balmy breath, which lend their glorious colouring to their various and sunny verse. There are stanzas in Tasso that make themselves peculiarly felt here. One, when Rinaldo is setting out by starlight on the adventure of the enchanted forest, full of the religion that wells up instinctively in the heart amidst these scenes, beneath this sky. But I have chiefly been occupied by Dante, who, so to speak, is an elemental poet; one who clothes in the magic of poetry the passions of the heart, enlightened and ennobled by piety, and who regards the objects of the visible creation with a sympathy, a veneration, otherwise only to be found in the old Greek poets. I have read the Purgatorio and Paradiso, with ever new delight. There are finer passages in the Inferno than can be found in the two subsequent parts; but the subject is so painful and odious, that I always feel obliged to shut the book after a page or two. The pathetic tenderness of the Purgatorio, on the contrary, wins its way to the heart; and again, the soul is elevated and rapt by the sublime hymns to heavenly love, contained in the Paradiso. Nothing can be more beautiful than the closing lines, which I quoted in a late letter, which speak of his return to earth, his mind still penetrated by the ecstacy he had lately felt.
My companions wanted a master for Italian. I asked Peppina if there was one to be found near. She recommended a friend of her’s at Menaggio: he was not accustomed to give lessons, but would for her sake. This did not sound hopeful. I tried to understand his charges; but though I put the question fifty times, she, with true Italian subtlety, slid out of the embarrassment, and left me uninformed: while I, for the hundredth time, did that which a hundred times I had determined not to do — engaged a person’s services at no fixed sum. The whole thing turned out ill. The man belonged to the dogana at Menaggio; his Italian was no better than Peppina’s own — who could talk it very tolerably for a short time; but in longer conversations soon slid into Comasque, or something like it. The man had no idea of teaching; and came so redolent of garlic, that the lessons were speedily discontinued. Of course, his charges were double those of a regular master.
I have spoken in praise of the Italians; but you must not imagine that I would exalt them to an unreal height — that were to show that misrule and a misguiding religion were no evils. It is when I see what these people are, — and from their intelligence, their sensitive organisation and native grace, I gather what they might be, — that I mourn over man’s lost state in this country.
The country people, I have already told you, hereabouts are a fine handsome race; many of the young women are beautiful, but their good looks soon go off. There are silk mills at Cadenabbia and Bolvedro, which employ a great many girls, who laugh and sing at their work, and, leaving it in troops at the Ave Maria, pass under our window ringing in chorus with loud, well-tuned voices. Their dress is picturesque; they wear their hair bound up at the back of the head in knotted tresses, to which are fixed large silver bodkins, which stand out like rays, and form a becoming head-dress; but, unfortunately, as they seldom take these bodkins out, and even sleep in them, they wear away the hair. You may guess, from this fact, that neatness and cleanliness are not, I grieve to say, among their good qualities.
It is strange that, though the men and women here are mostly handsome, the children are very plain. The contrary of this occurs in parts of Switzerland. Here, it a good deal arises from the diet: all the children look diseased — as well they may be, considering their food — and the wonder is, so many arrive at maturity. The deaths, however, are in a much larger proportion than with us. I hear of no schools in this part of the country, and the people are entirely ignorant: neither are the priests held in esteem. Thus thoroughly untaught, the wonder is that they are as good as they are. The church indeed is respected, though its ministers are not; but the enactments of the church are most rigorous with regard to fastings and ritual observances. If toil be virtue, however, these poor people deserve its praise. They work hard, and draw subsistence, wherever it can be by any toil abstracted, even from the narrow shelving of the mountains on which rich grass grows. The young men go to cut it each year; and it is so dangerous a task, that each year lives are lost, through the foot of the labourer slipping on the short grass, and his falling down the precipice. Fishing, of course, affords employment; and there is a good deal of traffic on the lake, which is carried on by flat-bottomed barges, impelled by large heavy sails, or by long oars, which they work by pushing forward. Unfortunately, in this part of Italy, they are not as so
ber as in the south, and drunken brawls frequently occur. The drunkenness of these men is not stupifying, as usually among us, but fierce and choleric. Great care is taken by government to prevent their carrying arms of any kind, even knives. They have, however, an implement called a fulcino, in shape like a small sickle, which is used for weeding, and cutting grass on the mountains; this they are apt to employ as a weapon of offence. It is, consequently, forbidden to carry it polished and sharpened, but simply in the tarnished worn state incident to its proper uses. This enactment is, of course, constantly evaded. They are drawn in every brawl; and the wound they inflict — a long ugly gash — is less dangerous, but more frightful than a stab. One evening, there was great excitement on a man being fulcinato at a drinking bout, at a neighbouring inn. One of my companions went to see him, and came back, horror-struck; he had a large, deep gash in the thigh, and was nearly dead from loss of blood. When a surgeon came, however, it was found that the wound was not dangerous. He was carried home in a boat; but it was two or three weeks before he could get about again. When these outrages occur, the police carry the aggressors to prison, where they are kept, we are told, ill off enough, till they consent to enlist. The life of a soldier in the Austrian service is so hard, ill-fed, and worse paid, that these poor wretches often hold out long; but they are forced, at last, to yield: nor is the punishment ill imagined, that he who sheds blood should be sent to deal in blood in the legal way. But the root of the evil still rests in the absence of education and civilisation; and one must pity the poor fellows, taken from their glorious mountains and sunny lake, and sent to herd among the sullen Austrians, far in the north, where the sound of their musical Italian shall never reach them more.
SEPTEMBER 8TH.
THIS is our last day. We are leaving the Lake of Como just when its season is beginning; for the Italians always make their villeggiatura in the months of September and October, when the fruit is ripe, and the vintage — the last gathering in of the year — takes place. The nobles, therefore, are now beginning to visit their villas. English visitants have built a few keeled boats, which, on going away, they either sold or made presents of to their Italian friends. There are two or three pretty English-built skiffs on the lake, which render it more gay and busy than before.
Numbers of the middling classes also, shopkeepers from Milan, congregate at Como and the villages, at this season. In some respects, however, this is not so pleasant, as there are many more visitors at the Albergo Grande. Each day crowds come by the steamer; tables are spread for them in the avenue of acacias, where they eat, drink, and are merry. We live at the other end of the house; and as these chance-comers all leave by the steamer, at four o’clock, they do not inconvenience us. But an English lady, who had taken rooms overlooking the avenue, grew very angry at the disturbance, called the Albergo Grande a pot-house, scolded Luigi, mulcted his bill, and crowned her revenge by writing in his disfavour in the traveller’s book of the Hotel at Como. For my own part, I love Cadenabbia more and more every day: every day it grows in beauty, and I regret exceedingly leaving it. My dearest wish had been to visit Venice before I turned my steps homewards, as there is a friend there whom I greatly desired to see; but I cannot go, and must resign myself.
I write these few last words from an alcove in the gardens of the Villa Sommariva, whither I have fled for refuge from the noise and turmoil of our hotel.
This is a very grand festa, named of the Madonna del Soccorso, and relates to the progress of the plague being stopped on one occasion through the intercession of the Virgin. The church is on a hill, about two miles from Cadenabbia, and twelve chapels are built, as stations, on the road leading to it. The whole of the inhabitants of the mountains around were concerned in the vow, and flocked in multitudes to celebrate the feast. In one village in particular, far away among the mountains to the north, the inhabitants had vowed always to wear woollen clothes cut in a peculiar fashion, and of a certain colour, if the remnants of their population — for nearly all had perished — were saved. These people walked all night, to arrive about noon at Cadenabbia. Their dress was ungainly enough, and must have been very burthensome to the walkers this hot day. It was made of heavy dark-blue cloth, with a stripe of red at the bottom of the petticoat — I speak of the dress of the women. I forget in what that of the men differs from that of the peasants of Cadenabbia. The crowd is immense; and the Albergo Grande is the focus where, going to, or coming from paying their devotions on the hill, they all collect. I grew tired of watching them from my window, and have retired to a shady bower of the gardens of the Villa Sommariva, where the hum of many thousand voices falls softened and harmless on my ear. “ Eyes, look your last!” Soon the curtain of absence will be drawn before this surpassing scene. You are very hard-hearted, if you do not pity me.
MIDNIGHT.
AND now the moon is up, and I sit at my window to say a last good-night to the lake. The bells, so peculiar a circumstance in this night-scene, “salute mine ear,” across the waters. Many a calm day, many a delicious evening, have I here spent. It is over now, lost in the ocean of time past. It is always painful to leave a room for ever in which one has slept calmly at night, and by day nurtured pleasant thoughts. I grieve to leave my little cell.
But enough — I will add a few words, the history of our last evening, and say good-night.
Very noisy and uproarious was our last evening; so that till now, when all is hushed, it seemed as if instead of quitting a lonely retreat among mountains, we were escaping from the confusion and crowd of a metropolis. The peasants drank tod much wine; they quarrelled with Luigi, and the fulcini were drawn. Care had been taken, however, to have police-officers near; on their appearance, all who could threw their weapons into the lake; two were taken with the arms in their hands, and hurried off to prison, which they will only leave as soldiers.
Late in the evening we paid our bill, and gave presents to the servants, usually a disagreeable and thankless proceeding. But here, all was so fair, the people so pleased and apparently attached, that no feelings of annoyance were excited. Poor people! I hope to see them one day again — they all gathered round us with such shows of regret that it was impossible not to feel very kindly towards them in return.
Good-night!
LETTER X.
Voyage to Lecco, — Bergamo. — The Opera of “Mose.” — Milan.
BERGAMO, 10TH SEPT.
FOB the sake of visiting scenes unknown to us, we arranged not to go by the steamer from Como to Milan, but hired one of the large boats of the place to take us to Lecco. We quitted Cadenabbia yesterday at five in the morning. Sadly I bade adieu to its romantic shores and the calm retirement I had there enjoyed. The mountains reared their majestic sides in the clear morning air, and their summits grew bright, visited by the sun’s rays. We doubled the promontory of Bellaggio, and quickly passing the picturesque rocks beneath the gardens of the Villa Serbelloni, we found that the lake soon lost much of its picturesque beauty. Manzoni and Grossi have both chosen this branch of the lake for the scene of their romances; but it is certainly far, very far, inferior to the branch leading to Como, especially as at the end of the lake you approach the fiat lands of Lombardy and the bed of the Adda. We break? fasted comfortably at Lecco, and hired a caliche for Bergamo. It was a pleasant but warm drive. Oh, how loth will the Austrian ever be to loosen his gripe of this fair province, fertile and abounding in its produce, — its hills adorned with many villages, and sparkling with villas. These numerous country-houses are the peculiarity and beauty of the region: as is the neighbourhood of Florence, so are all these hills, which form steps between the Alps and the Plains of Lombardy, rendered gay by numerous villas, each surrounded by its grounds planted with trees, among which the spires of the cypress rise in dark majesty. The fields were in their best dress; the grapes ripening in the sun; the Indian com — the second crop of this land of plenty — full-grown, but not quite ripe.
Variety of scene is so congenial, that the first effect
of changing the mountain-surrounded, solitary lake for the view of plain and village, and widespread landscape, raised my spirits to a very springtide of enjoyment. We were very merry as we drove along.
There is a fair at Bergamo; it has lasted three weeks, and the great bustle is over. We had been told that the inns are bad; I do not know whether we have found admission into the best, but I know we could scarcely anywhere find a worse. The look of the whole house is neglected and squalid; the bed-rooms are bare and desolate, and a loathly reptile has been found on their walls. The waiters are unwashed, uncouth animals, reminding one of a sort of human being to be met in the streets of London or Paris — looking as if they never washed nor ever took off their clothes; as if even the knowledge of such blessings were strangers to them. The dinner is uneatable from garlic. Of course, the bill to-morrow morning will be unconscionably high.
We have come to Bergamo chiefly for the sake of the opera, and to hear Marini, a basso — boasted of as next to Lablache — but, though fine, the distance is wide between. Being fatigued, I did not go to the upper town to see the view, which is extensive, and at the setting of the sun peculiarly grand. But to the opera we went. The house is large and handsome; but the draperies and ornaments of the boxes were heavy and cumbersome; they carried, too, the usual Italian custom of having little light in their theatres, except on the stage, to such an excess, that we were nearly in the dark, and could not read our libretto. The opera was the Mosè. That which is pious to a Catholic is blasphemous to a Protestant, and the Mosé is changed, when represented in England, to Pietro l’Eremita. None of the singers were good except Marini; but the music is the best of Rossini, and we appreciated this admirable master the more for having been of late confined to Donizetti. The quartetto of Mi manca la voce is perhaps his chef-d’oeuvre. The way in which the voices fall in, one after the other, attracts, then fixes the attention. I listen breathlessly; a sort of holy awe thrills through the notes; the soul absorbs the sounds, till the theatre disappears; and the imagination, deeply moved, builds up a fitter scene — the fear, the darkness, the tremor, become real. The whole opera is rich in impressive and even sublime vocal effects. In the ballet we had Cerito — her first appearance at Bergamo — and she was received most warmly. She danced three pas, and after each she was called on seven times. I had not seen her before; and, though not comparable to Taglioni for an inexpressible something which renders her single in the poetry of the art, Cerito is light, graceful, sylphlike, and very pretty.